Maryland corrections officials are struggling to reinforce a teetering security fence at a state prison in Hagerstown.

More than a year after the 41-year-old security and fencing system at the Roxbury Correctional Institution failed during a March 2024 storm, a windstorm last week nearly blew down a portion of the facility’s fence — again.

High winds on Thursday prompted officials to place the facility on restricted movement, meaning that staff must escort prisoners under certain circumstances due to the security challenges. The prison remains on that status while emergency repairs to the fence are being performed.

A spokesperson for the Maryland Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services confirmed the development on Tuesday, saying that the agency has submitted an emergency procurement order and that contractors are “slated to start work as soon as possible” to fix the fencing.

“Enhanced security patrols are also occurring to ensure there is no threat to public safety,” said spokesperson Keith Martucci.

A person with knowledge of the fencing situation at the facility sent The Baltimore Banner a photo of the apparent damage. The photo showed construction equipment appearing to be a backhoe propping up the barbed wire fencing, which was leaning outward.

The issues with the aging security perimeter at Roxbury were first brought to light by the correctional officers’ union last year. At the time, the union said that the staff at the prison were bearing the brunt of extra shifts and posts needed to guard the dilapidated fence.

Months later, a budget analysis laid out the steep costs that the prison system must undertake to replace the fencing at Roxbury: some $36 million over the next several years. The upgrades are expected to be completed in January 2028.

The independent analysis, by the state’s Department of Legislative Services, criticized the corrections department for its haphazard system of maintaining state-run prisons, which it described as “old and deteriorating, putting at risk the safety of the inmates, staff, and Maryland’s communities.”

The average age of the 18 correctional facilities run by the Maryland Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services is about 48 years, the analysis said. The corrections department operates with about $9 million in annual funding for critical maintenance, which the analysis says has been “level-funded for the past several years.”

The backlog for corrections facility maintenance is nearly $75 million, representing more than 28% of statewide facility maintenance backlogs.

Another $61 million project would replace the perimeter security fence system at the Eastern Correctional Institution on the Eastern Shore as well as replace the hot water system built in 1987.

Given that the Maryland corrections department has 18 facilities and each fence replacement takes about three years to complete, the analysis reports, “the agency stated that maintaining adequate perimeter security will require them to begin a fence project every other year.”